The day is Thorsday the Fifth of September. I am going to start anywhere. And I am not going to tell you he’s running thru a field.

This is The Bardo. The Brighton Bardo, that he was born into and that I now return. I’m not wiping away the liquid that my eyes are producing. I want him to feel a little light rain on his luminous coat that reflects and absorbs the sky like a Pegasus half horse half angel. Captain Blue Bear, is what I call him, to describe as accurately in pig-English his unique sky-tones and grizzly nobility. I tear away a piece of the outbound ticket to construct my smoke. Funny how the return was taken away. Funny how we entrust our intimacy to so-called beasts.

Robo-cop has to decide whether he’s human or a machine. It’s a lot easier to be cold and sociopathic. You don’t need to suffer anymore. But sometimes some Thing gets under your skin that forces you to feel. What a heartless bastard you would be to take a different road otherwise.

These are the sounds of The Brighton Bardo (Locational. AKA: Seven Lies. Where all roads lead back in and there is no escape). A place for the mad and the sick and the walking dead. A transient place where no one lives, just passing thru. An annex of Londinium, the Greatest City on Earth, connected by artery and blood.

I am sitting on the soiled, rat-stained carpet at The Asylum Hotel trying to figure out which rune is blood branded on a wad of beard I have stashed in my ear-phone pouch. I have connected the listening apparatus to the music transmitter and am attempting to connect the listening apparatus to my own ear so that I can join all the dots and roll with the reality. My listening ear is clogged up from high volumes but it’s okay ‘cause the earphones are broken too. I use my one good ear together with the one good earphone and now we’re dialing him in. That’s how we roll. He loves the radio. Keeps him company. He loves our soft husky girl voices too. Let’s bring him home gently. Let’s turn on the sounds of The Brighton Bardo, finally. ‘Cause it’s been about seven years already. Why is it so painful to connekt?

It is the solar wind chimes that burn my ear. I tone it down; at any moment someone could come in and disturb these natural instruments and this placid balance. Must be some fast-paced currents in there. I keep forgetting, I’m in there. It’s an effect on the ear. I know that the ear is the last to go, but I didn’t realize that memory worked this way. I keep forgetting I’m here already. In The Bardo. Probably ‘cause it’s too painful to remember. Which is why we have burial rites and why you should never utter a curse in to the dead. The solar storms. That’s interesting. You can pause in The Bardo and check your oracle or library.

The solar storms. He was like a beached whale. Large solar storms. Trapped and lost on European beaches (insert no other, tell the truth). Autopsies showed they were disease-free (I am no longer talking to you, but him). There are climactic changes ‘round here. They drive prey into the North Sea. We need to eat at some point, Boy. The Mariners follow to their doom. That’s not where we’re going, Buoy. Although we are attracted to the huge quantities of squid found in those colder waters, we can’t get stranded. We’ll be lost in the desert forever. We are eight-armed and forever. We are blue. We will eat you. Young males like us head North. We are Snow-Wolves with loyalty to our Master. We learn to read anomalies like you learn to read the contours on maps.

This is The Bardo.

Dominated from midnight by large-scale solar storms, like the ones we flew thru. I take you everywhere with me. The persistence of memory is the true suffering of us. Storms full of charged particles and radiation is the air we breathe in The Bardo. A wasteland of cold, distorted, powerful lights. We are in the sea now. We are lost. Communications and satellites have been damaged. I don’t think anyone can hear us back home. But if there’s anyone I would rather be with on the edge of the world – it’s you. It’s raining again, and I’m sorry if it’s toxic. I said that I was Artemis, long ago, and that you are forgiven. I take that back. The rain is toxic and it’s burning our eyes. We want to find these magnetic mountains, because you and me both are wrong, and that’s why I love you and I’ll go with you. They call it the ‘Guard-rail’ and we are curious about that because you are a bouncer and no-body puts baby in the corner. He howls all night. We’ve been given advice that the mountain range is rendered invisible now in 2017 and that means that we are allowed to swim into the North Sea. So, that’s where we’re heading. Stranded after the storm. We swim into a desert. The gate has been left open. For the first time in Seven or so years. In fact, the gate has been dismantled. And left by the front door. There is no need to close it anymore. All is empty. All is quiet. A longing for intimacy that will pile upon itself until I am removed from this place and put out of my misery. No more suffering. A quiet death. No more pain. Swirling colours stop. There’s no sound. Or Chaos. The Northern Lights Stop.

We pause for a moment. He is thirsty, so I hydrate him with my eye waters. I’m not turning the tap off for anybody. Not when we need it. His black lips and eyes pay the wages of Avon ladies with black lip-gloss and eyeliner. He is the black-faced annihilator.

It’s relatively quiet at The Asylum Hotel when I abandon him. Only planes overhead and a crack from a girl a few minutes ago. Time doesn’t work the way you think it does. But you already know that.

So let’s go back.

Chanting. We don’t know where it comes from. Sometimes it’s overtaken by cars. But somehow it persists. Could be music. Could be the beach. I’m coming back, don’t woof.

How do you do it? How do you kill?

I ask quite clearly with no expectation of an answer.

They say I’m cold ‘cause I bonded with a machine. Down here we try not to dwell on it. But when I return to The Bardo it is memory that is the air we breathe. I’m not allowed to put my heart on the line except for in The Bardo. Here, we talk. We say you’ve lost your intimacy-machine. Let me massage you.

I hesitate to Drown.

I’m going back when the present is still, present. She talks of the calm and the peak. It’s too late, as usual. We are now together again talking about drowning and we seem to know more about that than we like to admit. We are water-creatures. Water-creatures don’t talk about drowning. That’s like a fish saying to his buddy “I’m sorry mate, but I just wet myself”.

We are passing thru a place where people leave us alone. That is good. The trains sound like trees and the trees jangle. We are moving. That is good. The Drowning Electret hurries into some metal shape forms and builds railroads and pylons for us to move in. That’s where you will find us, ultimately. In the tin can rolling down the street. Amplified by some lonely guy. Transmitted to aliens on earth. Aliens, like flies, and dogs. And Octopi. And Earth. And Things that just ain’t human. Like cars, and bits of metal. And plastic. And dead-mans blood.

The transmission breaks up. Which is usually a sign for me to go. I’ll stay with you tho. You are passing thru The Bardo. Alone. And you will come back to me, but chances are I will be so world-weary-stressed that I will not recognize my Brother. And we shall pass by each other not even knowing. Whilst caressing twigs, like kids.

I am now alone. We have become separated. This break-up is aesthetically interesting. But, what is more interesting to me is finding you. I know it could take years. But I don’t want to draw it out that long and I’d rather have you by my side NOW. Your senses are superior to mine, and I need you to survive. It’s a break-up. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with this information. Describe it for you all? It sounds like a radio transmission. Breaking up. By an individual who calls themselves “Simon Whetham”. It sure is wet. We are drowning and lost.

We are starving. Or so that is how you always feel.

I’ll eat for you Brother.

And accidently tread on flies for you.

To help you sleep.

We are in The Bardo again.

Things are breaking up. Transmission flimsy.

It’s cold. But I think that’s normal. You are a Snow-Wolf. I laid two blankets upon you. It’s not the height of human accomplishment to be warm.

We are gonna find it tricky to navigate in these conditions. You are wild.

Your yelp grew softer. I was rarely frightened of you. Now we walk side by side, together. The only thing that can make me leave you is fear of death. And how can I fear loving what is dead.

There’s nothing really on the airwaves. It’s an absence. A static persistence. Pleasurable for some reason. Reasons such as 1) That it holds a deeper meaning that can be accessed thru deviant means. 2) That it is so devoid of meaning that the listener can transpose whatever they like into it and literally make these sounds their own. 3) That there is nothing there, which gives a lot of space to create worlds.

I guess it’s the sound of him disintegrating into the void whilst I heat a probably rotten meal in the oven to nourish myself. It has to be done, but you can’t help but think of alternatives. It’s breaking up. There’s nothing there. Has Question Time started again? (To go into another). I’ll come back. [I’m getting lost again – The maps are fizzling]

I’ve woken up. My thumb and my bed are on fire. The seagulls are screaming. The only problem is the siren.

It’s breaking up again. Feedback & noise. Lashing. THE PROCESS.

Voices. Memories tryna find a groove, a channel, a vessel. Radio.

Vacuum. Storm shutters down. I think we’ve been here before, the other night of fire. It’s a different day, a different reality. Different feet plodding thru the fog and filthy air. Senile and pleasant. Glitches, samples. I think we have come to the memory space. Processors. Fragments. Cyber-edited. Internal. No acoustics. Layers of Cycles. Regret. Hymnal. Cut grass. Whistling doppelgangers melting into a suburb. Erased. Memos. Night terrors of not recognizing this new room. Can’t reconcile. Archival. Snippets. Kreng-like. Cotton wool, dirty brainspace. Slowly snapping spine. Head tipped backwards, waking up mid-lobotomy. Is this the place where we forget. Eternal sunshine. Intruders, unknown presences, scrubbed out and shadows sanded down from the door frames. Mechanically dysfunctional neuroses. Backed into a corner, a collage of hyper-auditory-impressions. Distilled into a time-frame before silence and snow crunch. We are in the radio-space now. Meddled by winds and far-away gusts. Distant commune. Transmissions clearer. Pounding, haunted, rippling. Deep, depth tones emerging like liquid spirits. Total disorientation. Sweet little motives rising up from time to time like butterflies with the same colour as your loved one – something beautiful to catch a glimpse of before utter disintegration. Always fleeting. Paused dialogues and rain. Wet again. My rain soaked skin has its own memory. All the times we’ve been here before. We look for something outside. Particularly voices are soothing and we are listening out in this rain battered territory. Hymns clog up the Internet of Things. We can’t see the bigger picture, we are in fly-mode. Bondaged. Unfinished sentiments. Flecks of semantic recognition. Smashing a piano. A Time Machine. Argument. Nothing is rubbed out. Nothing is not heard. Running up and down the stairs. Walking thru the snow. Everything you’ve ever heard. Everything you’ve ever said. Everything you’ve ever heard said. Documented. In a cloud. When the cloud comes near – noise. The betrayal of coherence. You are longing for them. The things you have lost. Walking thru the snow. The sounds of the Northern Lights low enough that they touch your ears. You become a rowboat. Paddling thru serenely. With your wolf at your side. Watching out across a horizon that wants no end. Strangers now. Playing pool in a church hall. The ground has turned solid and you are alone. Watching from the other side. Unable to remember when you were here before. A gnawing deja vu. Stumbling often. Looking thru to some scene you can’t understand. Acoustic engulfment. STOP.

Whiskey nights over we wake up to this new storm. Buildings swaying like chewing gum and a sense of evacuation before the Leviathan.

I take my hat and shades off. Wipe my eyes. And focus on the Outside again. This fresh apocalypse. Check my seismometer.

I’m going to take Twelve steps forward and no more.

Everything stopped.

The eye was blue

I smell my finger. It smells of burnt flesh.

Opiate

The power is cut to my respirator

Images of red circles flowing outwards

The mangled cars at the feet of Beachy Head

Flowing under the ocean floor

Jerk

Angels swaying violently

A calm television

I can hear screaming through the walls. The room becomes a boat.

I’m turning you on now. I’m flipping my memory-switch to ‘Forget” for a moment to take this Thirteenth step.

I put my coat on, dig in. My one good ear. It’s 7am. Passing the underground car-park at the foot of Bear Road, where that old railway line used to hover above, now hovering in memory ‘cause it’s gone and things move so fast these days you gotta watch your back for the speed. Click ON. There’s no auditory simulation round here, this is the best we’re gonna get. No perfection. Raw perception, whether you like it or not. Too hot, take it off, too cold, put it on. Revolving door Brighton Bardo. There’s something about car-parks at this time of the morning. The silence and seagulls and high-pitched coins and bankcards and exhaustion. Transient scores to settle. We’ll go anywhere to get the business done. Facial recognition tells me that this one is coastal and that tells me it comes with its own cacophony. The noise of the sea. A constant thread that links these places. And out-sources others. It’s a time capsule in here. The outside world has toned itself down and made quick. A vault. An arena. This prolonged anxiety on a thread. An electric beam. I’m so upset, for no reason. I claw back at the rope. The snow-blizzard exercise at the Antarctic. A crude drawing of a face scribbled on to my bucket-head. The sine-wave safety line. Burning up. Persisting. The constant persistence of grit. Molded into vaults and safety chambers. To store yer car. And keep ‘em out. And move you. And kill you. Is it a saber. To drive into the heart of the void. An empty car-park. With all those homicide outlines of cars that died ages ago. Only one victim per bay. Each victim pays the toll. And the toll paves the way. Is it a purification. To make strange the mundane. A true Lynchian shape. Exotic birds come out for a sec. Escaped birds. The horrible sound of a person’s voice, so buried that it could be machine. It’s burning up. The voices. Black metal and noise and nihilism at dawn. The problem is these birds hide out here. Things don’t work the way they should do. You just hear the burning blistering breakfast symphony of the transience. No one lives here, no one lives here, just passing thru. I am amplifying dust. The constant stream of a singularity. Cutting thru the waste. Lending a hand to consistency AKA: TIME. Installing some statue with its finger pointed at you or away from you like a sundial. Depending on how deep the cellar goes. I’m fucking up tremendously and there’s only so many hours in the day I can squeeze all these errors in. When the landscape become black I kinda feel like there’s either no one playing or the greatest player on earth has just taken the stage. Either way. The silence has just reverse fizzled. And gone. Cheerz Seth, that’s truly masterful werk from the contact sheet. (Lucier bound)

Apologies for not writing more reviews over the last couple of months. I’ve been waiting for two things to wear off: the effects of a nasty virus and the novelty of being on Twitter. Both have rather dragged on. Anyway…

As part of this year’s fabulous TUSK Festival Joe Murray agreed to curate a small exhibition of tape label art titled Everyone Loves Tapes These Days. Looking for someone to write a brief wall text Joe reached out to his editor here at RFM and I replied with the following diatribe:

Interesting, and thanks for thinking of me – I’m flattered. However, I wonder if I am exactly the right guy for the job. Dare I say it? OK, deep breath: I’ve pretty much fallen out of love with tapes. I appreciate the determined anti-commercialism that they represent nowadays, and they are a good archive medium, but the format is cumbersome, inconvenient, space consuming and has no sonic advantages over other formats. Those beardies that talk about its ‘unique low end’ are talking out of their own low ends. I suppose I still do like the clacky sound of taking them in and out of their cases but if everything went download/CD-r tomorrow I wouldn’t care. Tapes = the price you pay for being a Culver fan. I might even go a bit further: what used to be a democratic, punk (‘home taping is killing music!’ well, GOOD) format has mutated over the years into a symbol of hipster elitism – maybe not in the context of the no-audience underground but that is what anyone vaguely knowledgeable about music looking in from outside would see. Tape walkmans aren’t as an awful an affectation as manual typewriters but, hey, matter of time…

Heh, heh – ain’t I naughty, eh? So do I actually believe all that or did Joe just catch me in a mischievous, belligerent mood? A bit of both, I think. Some clarifications and addenda are necessary.

Firstly, that bit about being an archive medium is true enuff – they won’t play after the aliens come and destroy civilisation with a massive electro-magnetic pulse but they will last until then which is more than can be said for CD-rs etc. Dude, my Mum has had that Billy Joel tape, like, for ever.

Secondly, I do really like the clacky sound of removing a tape from it’s box and sliding it into the deck. I also think the Tabs Out Podcast twitter feed is really funny. So that’s two tape related things that are good – fair as Solomon, me.

Thirdly, and more contentiously, the determined anti-commercialism/hipster elitism tension. I haven’t closely followed the rise of tape ‘culture’ but I’m sure arguments must have raged/might still be raging about this subject on corners of the internet that I am blissfully unaware of. I don’t have the energy or inclination to take a side. However there is one aspect of the business that I’m tempted to take a hard line on. Now, I have nothing but love for truly tape only noise labels (the ne plus ultra in the UK being Matching Head, of course – a label with no official internet presence, untouched by fashion, driven purely by the uncompromising vision of Lee ‘Culver’ Stokoe) but raise an eyebrow at self-described ‘tape labels’ that also offer downloads. Personally I prefer this arrangement for reasons given above – 98% of my musical appreciation is done via mp3 player – but I would argue that by offering downloads you can ditch the word ‘tape’ because yours is just a… label. Catch me in the same mischievous, belligerent mood that greeted Joe’s innocent request and I might say that you were actually a label providing music in the preferred, most convenient format of the day alongside unnecessary physical versions meant to tempt daft hipster object-fetishists – a demographic always keen to reify counter-cultural heft into something that can be neatly displayed on a shelf.

Heh, heh – more naughtiness – comments genuinely welcome. I am open to being convinced otherwise.

So, with that all in mind, my eyes wander to the tape section of the RFM review pile and I decide that a round-up is long overdue. Never mind my misgivings about the format, it’s the content that really matters right? Let’s see.

Clive Henry / Joined By Wire – split

Joined By Wire – ERA END and/or BAJM!

Boy, have I slept on these two tapes – Stephen of joinedbywire kindly sent me these months ago. Mea culpa.

Clive Henry‘s side of the split tape is like waking from a blackout caused by a blow to the head and piecing together the events that led to the assault. Bursts of vision-blurring pain, repeated verbal tics that refuse to resolve into coherent speech, stumbling. Or maybe it is Ted Hughes’s The Iron Man reassembling itself the morning after falling off that cliff. I like it very much.

Stephen’s side is perhaps not as nostrils-flaring, full-on psych as previous JBW releases admired on this blog but is no less terrific for being dialled down a notch. Instead what we have are a group of multi-limbed clockwork toys of indeterminate form defying the laws of thermodynamics by winding each other up into a clicking, buzzing, writhing mass of mechanical energy.

ERA END and/or BAJM! is Stephen’s contribution to a tape-swap project organised via the Bang the Bore forum. I was not involved in this so am grateful to him for sending me this spare copy – the last of an edition of 15. As ever, I deeply impressed with Stephen’s graphic work and faultless attention to detail – see photo for all the elements that make up this package – especially as this was originally only to be seen by the dozen people signed up to take part. The racket this time is up in the red. Thick clouds of noise create an atmosphere of salty feverishness with occasional sinus clearing bursts of stomping distortobeatz. That said, there are passages of relative calm too – imagine some brute devolved remnant of far-future humanity worshipping the one remaining artefact of our decadent age: a broken tape walkman.

BBBlood – Untitled

Paul Watson is a current scene leader in what I’ve always thought of as ‘proper’ noise. That is: a visceral racket created by rough-housing with physical objects, by combining field and domestic recordings and by filtering the lot through a rag-tag tabletop of battered and home-made electronics. However, that is not to belittle the skill and care with which Paul puts these recordings together. The sounds are not ends in themselves but chosen, ordered and edited as a means to establishing an atmosphere. His latest recordings eschew ‘harshness’ almost entirely and the listener is led through a post-industrial landscape of broken glass and burning tyres with, dare I say it, delicacy and finesse.

I can sense the leather-jacket owning section of my readership twitching with unease but don’t worry – I’m not saying Paul has gone all Nick Drake on us. He still get his balls out on occasion – and so magnificent are his plums that it is no wonder the crowd goes fucking apeshit when they are displayed. What I’m saying is the flashes of nad are appropriate and proportionate to the larger task at hand.

This recording by Cestine, the duo of Dominic Coppola and Theodore Schafer, hovers shimmering between the ‘nothing music’ of Karina ESP I described a few posts ago and the ‘extraction music‘ of Dan Thomas et al that I have been banging on about this year. Two tracks, each lasting fifteen minutes exactly, contain slowly cycling electronics augmented with field recordings – birds, the sea maybe, children – and snatches of whispered conversation, perhaps partially overheard whilst daydreaming, perhaps snatches of radio broadcasts crackling between the stations. It is constructed with a robust attention to detail that allows for deep, repeat listening but conveys a vulnerability, a brittleness too. The contemplative reverie it induces is bitter-sweet and emotionally complicated, like turning over the memory of an important friendship, now long lost. Recommended highly.

Hyster Tapes are punk as all fuck – black and white J-card, recycled tapes, photocopied flier advertising their warez (pictured) – and I wholeheartedly approve. Joe grokked the FOUR LETTER WORLD compilation back in March and as a result Heikki of the label kindly sent this too. Gotta keep that goodwill circulating – keeps it fresh and vital.

The Dear Beloved Henry side of this split, one 24 minute track titled ‘Advent’, is one of the best things I’ve heard all year. It is deceptively simple in execution: a flowing electronic drone groove with a vaguely East Asian feel – like 1970s Krautrock that has been listening to a bunch of gamelan LPs – works through the variations. However, every so often a magnetic pull distorts it off course and adds an intriguing, complicating layer of discordance. It’s like it was mastered to VHS and someone is now messing with the tracking. Is this an artefact of duping it to an old recycled tape or is this woosiness wholly intended? The result is magical either way.

Sadly the Albert Materia side, several tracks of fractured poetry with piano accompaniment, was not for me. Can’t win ’em all, eh?

Available from Hyster Tapes – email: plaa@pcuf.fi

Leitmotiv Limbo – LIMBO / WIND SWEPT

Also sent as result of Joe’s FOUR LETTER WORLD review. In ‘Limbo’ Elijah Vartto (umlauts over the vowels – apologies for the limitations of the WordPress editor) conjures an alien souk from the echoed honking of an unspecified wind instrument and stick-in-bucket metallic rhythms. The point of view changes every few minutes and gradually a scene is set, protagonists introduced. This comes together in a surprising burst of new wave pop before retreating to the abstract – a menacing bassy warble dragging us down to an underground bunker full of robot soldiers.

‘Wind Swept’ uses field recordings phased to sound like the fuelling of spacecaft over which mournful, austere jazz blowing accompanies growling, heavily filtered vocals. It’s the blues played by a band whose home-world was destroyed as a display of power intended to tame a petulant rebel princess. Guitar jangles like the rigging of boats. All eventually peters out to a gargling throb.

Comparisons have been made elsewhere to early Cabaret Voltaire. This is apt and, of course, a very good thing.

Finally then, what might be my pick of the bunch. Bryan (whose surname I suddenly realise I don’t know) operates in an adjoining laboratory to meta-musical collage-jockeys Spoils & Relics (indeed, I recently saw him play as a duo with that #KieronPiercy). The shared working method involves isolating sounds, sanding off their contexts and reassembling them into new fragmentary narratives – a perversely delicious anti-archaeology. Here Bryan invokes a dystopian, science fictional vibe but builds in a wry distance that stops it becoming self-important or parodic. The balance and compelling flow he maintains are both very impressive. In summary: I dig this.

This album scores maximum ideological purity points too. It was slipped to me, in person, by the artist, as we sat on a bench, under a tree, in a park, with Dan Thomas, one sunny lunchtime – a clandestine, samizdat-style handover. Now that is tape only.

I’ve no idea in what sense this this might be ‘available’ but you can email Bryan and ask: dorh@hotmail.co.uk

(CD, joint release by ATfield, Memoirs of an Aesthete & Bang the Bore)

…Phil Todd certainly thinks so and I suspect Seth Cooke agrees with him too. Bold claims need striking evidence, eh? Well, before I present my own findings you will have to endure a lengthy preamble. Get that finger off the scroll button – I know the anticipation is killing but, as you can’t actually buy this yet, there is plenty of time for musing…

Sometimes it is embarrassing to think how little I know about music. It has been a driving force in my life for 30 years and I have been recording, performing and promoting music for over a decade (well, on and off). I can pontificate for hours about subjects within my area of ‘expertise’ – this blog tops 100,000 words in total – but if you were to say to me ‘yeah, and what key is that in?’ then all I could do would be to stare at you blankly and guess. The black keys? I dunno. Despite years of experience developing a finely honed aesthetic I still know almost nothing about the technicalities of how this art form works.

My knowledge of musical history and the traditions outside of my field are similarly patchy. Whilst I don’t agree with Noel Fielding’s Vince in The Mighty Boosh when he describes all music prior to Human League as ‘tuning up’ I certainly understand the joke and have a good, self-deprecating laugh at my own limitations. With regards to ‘world music’ – if it wasn’t sampled by Cabaret Voltaire or encountered during the breathless couple of months I spent as a teenager trawling the libraries of West Sussex for gamelan CDs and listening to Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares then it is lost on me.

I’m not proud of this, I’m just being honest about the situation as it has a bearing on the review to come. I readily admit that a grasp of historical context, of critical theory and a proficiency in the technical and formal aspects of composition and performance can add a layer of nuance, detail and sophistication to musical appreciation. Just as a grasp of allegory and technique are invaluable in deciphering masterworks of art history separated from our current cultural idiom by time and/or distance. Those prepared to learn are rewarded for their effort.

But is this always necessary? Can’t I just like what I like? Just get my groove on? There’s a story about how a collaboration between Miles Davis and Jimi Hendrix came to naught because the latter didn’t read music and thus could do nothing with the compositions the former sent over. ‘Aww, man, tragedy!’ I thought when I first heard about it, then, later: ‘what a ridiculous waste.’ To nix a possibility as mouth-watering as this because Hendrix had no formal musical education is criminally dumb. What does it matter? Get in the studio and improvise – play jazz for fuck’s sake.

Away from music one of my other interests, as alluded to above, is art history. I have been lucky enough to stand in front of some of the most striking products of human creativity – say, for example, Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin in the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari in Venice, the most perfect man-made object I have ever encountered – and have found myself transported by an unmediated, awestruck reverie in which all ‘learning’ just falls away, irrelevant. Can you imagine Titian providing the now ubiquitous ‘artist statement’ by way of explanation? The idea is grotesque.

Thus with ground prepared – rock of theory on one side, hard place of intuition on the other – we come to The Night Must Fall by After the Rain. I want to convince you that it is wonderful but how to go about it? Well, first an infodump:

After The Rain was formed in 2009 in Southampton, UK, by instrumentalists/composers Hossein Hadisi (Iran), Ignacio Agrimbau (Argentina) and Joe Kelly (UK). They met at the University of Southampton, where they studied composition under Michael Finnissy. Originally emerging as the last mutation of The Hola, an eclectic ensemble founded by Agrimbau in 2005, After The Rain’s sound combines elements from electroacoustics, ‘free’ improvisation, and DIY aesthetics. More importantly, the group uses performance practices and creative methods derived from Persian classical music, which is at the centre of Hadisi and Agrimbau’s research projects.

This blurb accompanied the inclusion of the track ‘Distance III’ on one of those dreary compilation CDs that come with pointless snore-fest The Wire magazine – more on this track later. The description is as dry and cold as hotel toast but it will do to get the chronology and spellings correct. It also hints at the difficulties that lie ahead for an ignoramus such as me: “the group uses performance practices and creative methods derived from Persian classical music, which is at the centre of Hadisi and Agrimbau’s research projects.” Whoo boy – rumbled!

How much does this last point matter? Well, I don’t need to know (presumably) Farsi as the lyrics are helpfully translated into English in the booklet. Do I need to know anything about Persian Classical music or the band members’ research projects? Hmmm… it might help. I can get with the electroacoustic buzzing. That clatter-scratch is perfectly within my usual remit, but the ringing metal percussion, breathy, snorted flute (or flute-ish wind instrument) and guttural vocals – mellifluous or hacking in turn – are tricky. How much is rehearsed, how much improvised? I have no way of knowing. There is some exquisite violin playing on this but I find myself reaching for clichés such as ‘mournful’ to describe its beautiful, emotionally electrifying harmonics. I find myself humbled, discombobulated and wanting to learn.

But enuff of brains, what about guts? What does it feel like? Well, it feels great, thanks for asking. Whilst on the level of theory my ignorance is a hindrance, down here it is a positive boon. Never mind the subtle nuances and clever allusions of the musicologists, the alien nature of this racket is glorious and eye-opening. There is plenty of meditative content but nothing that can be slipped into like a warm bath, I’m kept on my guard, even when lulled. As well as the delight of being surprised I’m totally grooving on trying to figure this stuff out and then, when I can’t, just letting it carry me along. Like a wave washing me up on a shore full of unfathomable sea-worn objects and strangely knotted driftwood. Is it cheating to relish the rewards of not knowing what the fuck is going on? I hope not, because that is what I am doing.

So finally we come to the beginning. The first track on this album is called ‘Distance III’ and is an indescribable marvel that works perfectly on both the levels I have been talking about. It’s smart as a magic trick: a mysterious delight, a thrilling intellectual puzzle and it’s as visceral as a giant octopus attack. It isn’t representative of the album as a whole (which, in general, involves a lot more percussive racket) but that is OK because it isn’t representative of anything, or at least anything that I currently understand. Three minutes of genius. No wonder that the band picked it for the Wire magazine CD, no wonder Seth Cooke used it to kick off Missing Nothing – his gargantuan, 6 CD-r, fund raising compilation for Bang the Bore. On that website, which Seth co-curates, you can watch a video of the band performing this track live at a gig in Leeds that I was lucky enough to attend. They split the audience – which you know is a good sign.

Sadly, this album is not yet commonly available. Despite being completed last year it has been stuck in ‘development hell’ ever since. If you’d like to find out more, perhaps help provide the finance so sorely needed to get it distributed, then email via Bang the Bore – bangthebore@gmail.com – and the caretakers there will happily put you in touch with the band.

So here I am trying to think of something clever and elegant to say about some clever and elegant music by some clever and elegant people but failing because my train of thought keeps being derailed. The other day, as we were strolling about the grounds of Midwich Mansions, Daniel Thomas and I had an interesting conversation about the economics of music with reference to live music and the structure of the no-audience underground in particular. This has led to some intrusive musing which has been blocking my attempts at writing reviews and which I will have to write down in order to clear from my head. No! Come back, where are you going? This will be really interesting, I promise…

OK, leaving London to one side as it has its own rules, experience has shown me that most UK conurbations of city-ish size can rustle up 20 people interested enough in the type of experimental music RFM covers to turn up to gigs. 10 or less if you are unfortunate, 30 plus if your scene is thriving. Should you wish to perform in this ‘arena’ then these people are your audience: the subset of this crowd who can turn up on that evening.

Marketing and promotion do little to alter these numbers. This is because music of this type will always be a fringe interest (ignoring little blooms of hipster popularity every now and again) but that fringe is well-informed and inquisitive. As long as the gig is plugged in whatever the usual places are (for example in Leeds we have the essential Cops and Robbers) then the cognoscenti will find out about it and do their best to roll up.

Sadly performers should expect very little pay, if anything, for their endeavours. This is for two main reasons. Firstly, having money dulls the mind and erodes taste so no-one interesting ever has any. Thus, by definition, we are too brilliant to be anything other than skint. Secondly, for almost everyone involved in the no-audience underground – artists, promoters, labels, writers and so on – this is a leisure activity, a *ahem* ‘lifestyle choice’. No matter how driven we are to create and to present our creations to others, this is a not a living and anyone who expects decent money in return for their participation in what is, to be brutally frank, a hobby is, to be a bit less brutally frank, optimistic.

A few weeks ago I came late to a thread on the Bang the Bore forum started in June by frequent poster KNICKERS. It was called ‘fair trade music’ and started thus:

<link to article arguing for the fair remuneration of artists and against illegal downloading>

This article talks about it as a joke – the idea that we buy coffee which is fair trade because we want to see the labourers remunerated fairly for their labours. Why don’t music-labourers get remunerated fairly for their labour? Over to you.

My initial response to this was the thought ‘I don’t know any music-labourers’. I know dozens of often very dedicated hobbyists but no-one who makes a sizeable chunk of their income via their musical endeavour. ‘Music-labourers’ in my humble context struck me as daft as saying ‘angling-labourers’ or ‘model-railway-enthusiast-labourers’ – sure, there might be some money in it, I suppose, but there is certainly no right to expect there be money in it. I didn’t post a reply though for two reasons. The first is that it would have been a bit disrespectful. The Bang the Bore forum does attract comments from some pretty serious ‘real’ musician types and I can only say ‘good luck’ to those who are trying to find a way to pay the bills with non-pop/rock performance. The second is that I thought the ‘debate’ was satisfactorily concluded by the second comment, a one line reply from that tousle-haired scamp Duncan Harrison:

COS MORE THAN 20 PEOPLE IN MY TOWN ARE INTERESTED IN COFFEEE AAAYOOOOO!!!!

Well, quite – no manners, but the chap has boiled down my point to its essence. All the arguments and discussions about copyright, ‘piracy’, new versus old ‘business models’, fair levels of remuneration, marketing, promotion, the ‘physical’ versus the downloadable etc. that clutter the internet ad nauseum (including, I have to admit, a few points made by yours truly on this blog) are irrelevant to us because no one is interested in what we do. There seem to be two possible reactions to this undeniably true conclusion: a) shake your fist at the gods and complain about the unfairness of your genius going unrecognized and unrewarded or b) take strength from its gloriously liberating implications. I say go with the latter.

I’m afraid that if your idea of ‘reward’ is more than some taxi money, a few quid in your paypal account and a glowing review on radiofreemidwich then you are going to have to do something else. But if you aren’t bothered, in fact if you are driven to create by an urge independent of possible rewards then you can do whatever you want purely for the love of it and only subject to the constraints that we have to accommodate in every other aspect of our lives (money, family, employment etc.). This simple, eye-opening fact is truly heartening and this blog is testament to the many terrifically talented artists who are grasping this opportunity and wringing as much joy as they can out of it, sometimes in difficult circumstances.

Right, there was more but that seems like an inspiring high-point to end on. Now I’m off to stuff duvets into bin-liners so Aqua Dentata and BBBlood (see below) don’t have to freeze as they kip on Dan’s floor tonight…

An end of year list is irresistible isn’t it? No matter how fallacious and arbitrary, it is nigh on impossible not to flick forward or scroll down to the number one slot. And who am I to deny you that festive pleasure, eh? They can also be incredibly useful. For example, The Wire assigning top spot last year to that awful album by Actress finally freed me from any obligation to read that silly publication again. What a time-saver!

Last year my round-up was all encompassing and fairly hefty. This year I’m keeping it to the point and, as far as music goes at least, well within the no-audience underground. This adds a bonus frisson to proceedings as many of you reading this will have reason to take my meaningless judgements personally. Mmmm… what could be more delicious? Maybe a warm mince pie with brandy butter…

And hasn’t it been a cracking year? Along with the people and releases detailed below I have to mention a few other non-categorizable inspirations. The consistently great writing to be found at Idwal Fisher is such a huge influence on this blog that I’m hoping Mark believes imitation really is the sincerest form of flattery. I’ve been delighted by the return of the paper fanzine to my doormat in the form of indescribable packages from Spon and Hiroshima Yeah! I have been awestruck by the all-or-nowt work ethic and decision making of Simon DDDD who not only created DDDD’s unfathomable online presence but then deleted the lot in a breath-taking act of self-immolation once he decided it had run its course. There then followed the even more jaw-dropping New Luddite Tapes project during which he created 72 releases – all recorded himself – within four months. This has now also imploded, though some remains can still be picked over at the website. Who knows what will come next? Not me, that’s for sure. And on that bewildering note, on with the show…

(Methodological aside: the music mentioned below may not have been released this year, although most of it was. To qualify it just had to be heard by me for the first time in the calendar year 2011. There are five award categories ending with a prize, yes you heard right: an actual prize, for the album of the year.)

5. The “I’d never heard of you 10 minutes ago but now desperately need your whole back catalogue” New-to-RFM Award is shared by…

Of Plurals, RFM said: “…one of the most striking things I’ve heard this year…” (full review here) and the verdict was similar for Eyeballs “…intelligent, wryly humourous and unashamedly ambitious…” (see here and here and here). If you ever feel inclined to pay attention to what I say, I urge you to check these guys out.

4. The “Astral Social Club” Award, given for maintaining quality control over a huge body of work making it impossible to pick individual releases in an end of year round up goes to…

Andy has generously provided review copies of some of the most intriguing and involving music that I have heard in years. His brain food has nourished a selection of my most baroque, gushingly lyrical and borderline nonsensical reviews.

By agreeing to publish the lovely article Pete Coward had written about FFR then expertly conducting the interview that followed, Seth Cooke not only helped me put that era to bed – the definitive account is now on record – but inspired me to reactivate midwich too. New releases and live appearances are in the works and it is, to a large extent, his fault.

Finally, I would like to officially acknowledge the work of Joe Posset, RFM’s North East correspondent. As well as providing a stream of his own terrific recordings, Joe’s tiggerish enthusiasm and selfless generosity have hipped me to many great acts and labels, including Fuckin’ Amateurs and Andrew Perry. His efforts have been very much appreciated.

2. The Label of the Year Award

Well, given what I said above, it will come as no surprise to hear that the winner is… Striate Cortex. I needn’t say any more. Everything I have written about Andy’s enterprise can be read by clicking here.

This is the biggie so I’m going to do a proper reverse-order run-down for added anticipation. It goes without saying that everything by the artists mentioned above automatically makes the longlist for this award. In addition to that cavalcade of excellence honourable mention must also be made, in no particular order, of the following:

All terrific. Click on a title to be taken to my review. Now on to the big three:

The 3rd best album of year is:

The Piss Superstition – A Themepark for Whatever Happened Before

I wrote: “For me, Julian’s work has always called to mind machinery, often on an unimaginable scale, working to some forgotten purpose, on the brink of being overwhelmed by entropy and halting altogether … It is an absolutely brilliant way of conveying the devastating effort it takes to feel something – anything – in this alienating world we live in.” Full review and article here.

The 2nd best album of the year is:

Ceramic Hobs – Oz Oz Alice

I wrote: “This band is not only ‘going there’ but doing so willingly and, whilst there, using some voodoo power to create this music for the rest of us. My mind boggles – rather them than me. Simon suggests that this might be the last Ceramic Hobs album. I very much hope it isn’t but, if so, it would be a magnificent way to bow out.” Full review and article here (wierdly, still my most popular post ever).

..and finally, The Zellaby Award for Album of the Year goes to:

Ashtray Navigations – Cinderella Stamps

I wrote (in a post titled, fittingly, ‘ashtray navigations are my favourite band: empirical fact’): “…it is almost comical to me how perfectly it ensures that I get my groove on. Pretty much every musical element I dig is there, distilled and combined. One finger piano? Check. Expansively tangerine wob-wob synths? Check. Red-hot tropical guitar? Check … Imagine Phil and Mel soundtracking the adventures of an interstellar Buddha, preaching the eternal truths to bewildered alien races on Chris Foss style space-arks…” Full review and article here.

To be honest, given the quality of their work, Ashtray Navigations and associated projects could have featured heavily in every category (except ‘newcomer’, of course) but I kept ’em out of it knowing that the most glittering of prizes would be theirs in the end. Speaking of which…

The Award Ceremony

Some background: in early November I gave up drinking diet coke and in late November it was my dear Grandmother’s 92nd birthday and the combination of the two factors led to the first Zellaby Award for Album of the Year. Now, I realise that last sentence doesn’t make any sense at all, so allow me to join the dots.

For years I have drunk at least half a litre of that nastily acidic, highly caffeinated ‘delicious beverage’ (original phrase removed at the insistence of RFM’s legal team) every day. Finally, I convinced myself that this was a foolish thing for a grown man to be addicted to and ‘may have been’ (lawyers again) detrimental to my health. So I went cold turkey. The caffeine withdrawal not only gave me a bitchin’ headache for days but also led to a few decaffeinated moments of clumsiness and doziness. For example: I dropped a load of eggs on the kitchen floor whilst attempting to open the fridge with my elbow, I put some delicate bedding in the tumble drier and it is now no longer King size (or even Queen or Jack size, more like Nine of Clubs size. The pillowcases look like crocheted iPhone covers.) and then I made a mistake in Marks and Spencers…

I was in the process of assembling a parcel of birthday goodies to send to my Grandmother. It was to contain a long handwritten letter, some photos, a birthday card and some easily postable presents, one of which was to be a M&S voucher. I dutifully trotted down to the shop, made my purchase and it wasn’t until I got on the bus home that I realised I’d picked a card that said ‘Merry Christmas’ on it. “Bollocks,” I said out loud to my fellow passengers and went back the next day for a ‘Happy Birthday’ one.

My grump lifted when I decided that it might be funny to award the spare token as a prize to the artist responsible for RFM’s album of the year and, when I realised I saw that band in the pub most Thursday lunchtimes, the possibility of getting a photo of the ‘ceremony’ for the blog was irresistible. So here we are. I handed over the prize at lunchtime today and the reaction of bewildered delight was exactly what I was aiming for:

The official photo, Phil & Mel remain a little suspicious as to what I’m up to…

…the realisation that they have actually been given something of worth…

…the descent into emotional delirium as the moment proves too much for Phil.

And on that happy note I’d like to call the 2011 Zellaby Awards to a close. Thank you all for being such a beautiful (no-)audience. Goodnight, comrades.

I am delighted to announce that part two of Bang the Bore’s article about fencing flatworm recordings, oTo tapes, midwich and this blog is now available to peruse. I was in an expansive mood throughout this interview so it may be wise to don your smoking jacket, mix a martini and replenish your chip’n’dip before settling down. I hope you find much of interest. It was certainly a lot of fun to do and has inspired my recent creative endeavours (of which more anon). Thanks again to Seth and Pete for doing an amazing amount of homework and asking some incisive and entertaining questions.

Whilst I’m in self-congratulation mode, may I also note that RFM recently enjoyed its 11,000th ‘hit’ – a total up 175% on this time nine months ago. The last 1000 hits have come in less than a month! I am quietly proud of this modest result and would like to thank all those who have visited and contributed. Cheers folks – I’m touched.

Finally, I have also updated the ‘About me and this blog’ page (tab above) to give a more accurate account of what this blog has become over the (almost) two years of its existence.

Hello to anyone visiting after reading Pete Coward and Seth Cooke’s lovely article posted at Bang the Bore about my work with fencing flatworm, oTo and this blog. I hope you find much of interest here, not least many free-to-download mp3s of FFR releases. Should you be a regular reader wondering what I’m talking about then mix yourself a drink, settle down and click here.

Part one is an article written by Pete Coward (described by Seth as: “bootlegger/blagger and Wire website tech guru”, known only to me as “that guy who used to buy stuff that I met at that one show once”) about FFR and its philosophy. His thoughts are insightful, generous and laid out with panache and I am grateful to the point of jaw-dropping amazement that he gave my (*ahem*) legacy (*snigger*) such considered consideration. Part two, to come in a fortnight or so, is a lengthy email interview with yours truly conducted by Seth with Pete chipping in. I hope you find the exchange as entertaining to read as it was to write.

Being involved in this project has been great fun and, of course, enormously flattering. I enjoyed having to think hard about what motivated the Rob of ten years ago; it was a very interesting experience to apply the benefit of hindsight to the FFR/Termite Club days. Sorting all that out in my head is one of the major factors inspiring my continued reactivation of midwich (watch this space). Should you not be aware of Bang the Bore I heartily recommend frequent and substantial visits. It is a force for the good.